Tuesday, January 26, 2010

What about homeopathy then?

There has been some predictable (and entirely justified) outrage over the fake "bomb detectors" that turned out to be dowsing twigs with jargon. And the person who sold them has been arrested.

But Boots (UK pharmacist, for those who don't know) sell homeopathic "remedies" that consist of nothing more than water or sugar pills, with not a sniff of active ingredient.

Can anyone explain why they aren't also being arrested? I suppose one defence may be that Boots is relying on the frauds of others, and not pretending that these products work (in fact, they openly admit that they do not). What about the doctors who prescribe them, too?

9 comments:

I am afraid I don't consider them similar. If the placebo effect is quite strong for someone who believes that they work should we throw away such placebo effects?

Or am I just mistaken with stories of drug trials having a placebo effect of causing hair to drop out because the placebo patients wanted to be receiving the genuine drug? These just being myths would seem quite plausible for what little I know.

Of course if the prices were the equivalent of charging $40,000 for a cheap $3 non effective piece of electronics then I would be a lot harsher on Boots. As it is, the prices Boots charge may well be a sensible price to pay to get the placebo effect for someone who believes it will work. If that is possible, why ban them or arrest Boots executives and throw away potentially useful placebo effects?

I would be in favour of allowing doctors to prescribe sugar pills without making it public that they were doing so if this could be done without damaging patients trust of doctors.

There could be a deterrant effect of non-working detectors being used and this could be made out to be equivalent to a placebo effect. But if the Iraqi authorities just wanted that, then they wouldn't have paid $85m for them.

If Iraq had paid $20,000 for 2000 detectors would you say they got what they paid for or still expect the UK vendor to be arrested if he maintained the equipement did work?

Crandles - its not just about harmlessly getting the placebo effect. It's about homeopathy being part of a global anti-science network of unreal medicine. The people who push it are often vaccine deniers who malign and abuse science unreasonable, thus contributing to the social breakdown of reasonable trust in science. Homeopaths even contribute to the spread of disease:http://www.badscience.net/2007/09/homeopathy-gives-you-aids/

Much of the "security theatre" at airports is also there for deterrence rather than actual detection - and of course "TV detector vans" work in the same principle (non-British may find this rather bizarre, I don't know if this curious concept is even found in other countries). Obviously, the effects of these treatments (homeopathy, fake bomb and TV detection respectively) depends solely on the level of patient belief, and the price paid is a critical factor in maintaining that belief. Would terrorists, or TV licence non-payers, be deterred by a dowsing twig snapped off the nearest tree?

I do think that the placebo effect throws up some interesting ethical problems relating to honesty in medicine. But a doctor should be able to say "I think taking these should help you" in a nonspecific way without inventing a whole field of anti-scientific claptrap that preys on the gullible and actually damages effective medicine (as guthrie, and my links above, document).

It would be better if we could experience the placebo effect from something that is actually healthy rather than neutral. In the UK, perhaps it would be Apples. I mean the fruit not the electronics although with the rumours of the new Apple Tablet...

Probably in Japan we should believe in satsumas in winter and melon in summer. So - how do I convince myself it will work to cure all ills? I do believe in a mild placebo effect in general... but how to con myself that satsumas can work for me?

I think the general point is that it only works if you think it is real medicine! Hence the ethical problem. If doctors said "here's a sugar pill, it has no effect but you'll feel better anyway, oh and that'll be £7.20" then they might not work quite so well...

But satsumas are full of Vit C. And they make you go orange if you eat enough of them (supposedly). Must be a winner!